(Reuters] -Russian parliament to consider ban on Russian prisoner of war exchanges for Ukrainian Azov Regiment prisoners, the speaker announced Tuesday. The statement came after the surrender of the last Ukrainian defenders at Mariupol’s Azovstal Steel Works to Russian forces.

One-time nationalist militia, the Azov Regiment was now part of Ukraine’s National Guard. It became the front line of resistance to Russian troops in Kiev, and saw fierce fighting during what Moscow calls its “special military operations” in Ukraine.

Moscow however has described it as the principal perpetrator of the anti-Russian radical nationalism, or even Nazism. It claims that Ukraine needs to protect its Russian-speakers.

Vyacheslav Volodin (Speaker of the State Duma) said that its members are “Nazi criminals” and should be excluded from prisoner swaps.

He said, “They’re war criminals. We must do all we can to get them to jail.”

According to the Duma website, he asked security and defense committees for an instruction in this regard.

It denies that it is racist, fascist or neo Nazi, while Ukraine claims it has been reformed from its radical nationalist roots.

Kyiv denies Russian speakers were persecuted or arrested in Ukraine and claims that the Russian government has a fascist agenda to violate human rights. This claim is repeated every day on Russian media.

Moscow claimed that over 250 Ukrainian soldiers in the steelworks surrendered and 51 were being treated for severe injuries.

Dmitry Peskov, spokesperson for the Kremlin, stated that President Vladimir Putin has guaranteed all will be treated in accordance to international standards.

Russia and Ukraine are already involved in several prisoner exchanging.

Hanna Malyar (Deputy Defence Minister of Ukraine) stated that an “exchange procedure” will take place for the return of soldiers.

Leonid Sloutsky (one of Moscow’s representatives in the talks with Ukraine) and the Duma’s chairman of its international affairs committee called the Azov fighters “animals of human form”; he said that they should be sentenced to death.

“They are not worthy to live in the wake of the crimes against humanity which they have committed, and continue to commit against our prisoners,” he said.